1. Technical Field
The present invention generally relates to an apparatus for selectively securing a vehicle door in the open position. More particularly, the present invention relates to a detent mechanism for use in a paint shop of an assembly plant to secure a vehicle door in the open position when needed for painting purposes.
2. Discussion
An automotive assembly plant is generally separated into three centers: body, paint, and assembly. The body center is where the sheet metal is combined together to produce a structure for the vehicle. This structure, or body, is then transported into the paint center. The paint center includes a number of sequenced steps including the application of base coat, E-coat, heat treatment and clear coat. After the body has been painted it is sent to the assembly center. The assembly center is where all remaining parts are attached to the painted body.
In the paint center, the doors of a vehicle must open and close numerous times in order to facilitate the proper painting of a vehicle. For example, the doors must be remain open in order to paint the inner portion of the door and the doors must be closed when painting the exterior portion of the door and the remainder of the vehicle exterior. In order to accomplish this task, a mechanism is utilized to keep the doors open but allows the door to close when this is desirable.
An assembled vehicle has doors that are kept open by means of door check strap or the like attached to both the doors and the body of a vehicle to provide the doors with a number of possible detents. These detents provide the door the ability to maintain a number of different open positions when desired by the operator of the vehicle. Vehicles are normally outfitted with door check straps in the assembly center subsequent to painting. A typical door check strap is comprised of materials that could not withstand the heat and processing steps in the paint shop, and, therefore, cannot be installed earlier in the vehicle construction. In addition, placement of a check strap on the vehicle creates shadowing which is discussed in detail below.
The need for a door open device has led many manufactures to install temporary metallic check straps on each vehicle before it enters the paint shop. This creates a number of problems. First, the cost of a metallic check strap is so high that it must be reused. Furthermore, the metallic check strap must be cleaned after every use to remove paint, thus adding even more cost to the scenario. Another problem is that the metallic check strap interferes with the path of paint sprayed towards the door inner panel. Hence, the metallic check strap will cause shadowing where paint is not uniformly applied and that can lead to customer dissatisfaction. Shadowing is defined as an area that does not receive sufficient paint or other coating due to an obstruction of the spray path.